from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
- n.pl. An order of insects having the anterior pair of wings (elytra) hard and horny, and serving as coverings for the posterior pair, which are membranous, and folded transversely under the others when not in use. The mouth parts form two pairs of jaws (mandibles and maxillæ) adapted for chewing. Most of the Coleoptera are known as beetles and weevils.
from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- An order of Hexapoda, or of the class Insecta proper, having the posterior pair of membranous wings sheathed by the hardened anterior pair called elytra, which when folded together usually form a nearly complete covering of the body; the sheath-winged insects or beetles.
- n. Plural of coleopteron.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- n. beetles
Sorry, no etymologies found.
The green beetle can be both green and a member of the coleoptera, just as a writer such as Melville can be a world traveler and influenced by the German Romantics, but also the author of a book that forms one of the gigantic foundation stones of "American Literature."
The Beetles are insects from the group coleoptera.
Many coleoptera of the family Pasalidae are also endemic to the Sierra Madre del Sur, which is also one the richest areas in butterfly species (161 species) in the Mexican Pacific.
Assemblages of fossil coleoptera (beetles) have been obtained from eight sites in southern England that date from the early phase (Pinus — Quercetum mixtum — Corylus pollen assemblage zone) of the Eemian (Ipswichian) interglacial Stage.
In the forest itself the only common and conspicuous coleoptera were two tiger beetles.
All insects that slough at all slough in the same way; as the silphe, and the empis or midge, and all the coleoptera, as for instance the cantharus-beetle.
Some of the coleoptera and of the small and nameless insects make small holes or cells of mud on a wall or on a grave-stone, and there deposit their grubs.
The coleoptera are, without exception, devoid of stings; the diptera have the sting in front, as the fly, the horsefly, the gadfly, and the gnat.
There are several species of coleoptera that have lost the power of flight, for one reason or another.
But, the moment it came in view, it began to dwindle, and that so rapidly that, in a couple of seconds at most, a little heap of drapery was lying on the floor, on which was a truly astonishing example of the coleoptera.